Diodorus Siculus, Library 8-40

§ 14.74.3 Of these some raised their hands to heaven and returned thanks to the gods, and others declared that the barbarians had suffered the punishment of heaven for their plundering of the sanctuaries.

§ 14.74.4 For from a distance the sight resembled a battle with the gods, such a number of ships going up in fire, the flames leaping aloft among the sails, the Greeks applauding every success with great shouting, and the barbarians in their consternation at the disaster keeping up a great uproar and confused crying.

§ 14.74.5 But as night came the battle ceased for the time, and Dionysius kept to the field against the barbarians, pitching a camp near the sanctuary of Zeus.

§ 14.75.1 Now that the Carthaginians had suffered defeat on land as well as on sea, they entered into negotiations with Dionysius without the knowledge of the Syracusans. They asked him to allow their remaining troops to cross back to Libya and promised to give him the three hundred talents which they had there in their camp.

§ 14.75.2 Dionysius replied that he would not be able to allow the whole army to escape, but he consented to their citizen troops alone withdrawing secretly at night by sea; for he knew that the Syracusans and their allies would not allow him to make any such terms with the enemy.

§ 14.75.3 Dionysius acted as he did to avoid the total destruction of the Carthaginian army, in order that the Syracusans, by reason of their fear of the Carthaginians, should never find a time of ease to assert their freedom. Accordingly Dionysius agreed that the flight of the Carthaginians should take place by night on the fourth day hence and led his army back into the city.

§ 14.75.4 Himilcon during the night conveyed the three hundred talents to the acropolis and delivered them to the persons stationed on the island by the tyrant, and then himself, when the time agreed upon had arrived, manned forty triremes during the night with the citizens of Carthage and began his flight, abandoning all the rest of his army. He had already made his way across the harbour, when some of the Corinthians observed his flight and speedily reported it to Dionysius.

§ 14.75.5 Since Dionysius took his time in calling the soldiers to arms and gathering the commanders, the Corinthians did not wait for him but speedily put out to sea against the Carthaginians, and vying with each other in their rowing they caught up with the last Phoenician ships, which they shattered with their rams and sent to the bottom.

§ 14.75.6 After this Dionysius led out the army, but the Siceli, who were serving in the army of the Carthaginians, forestalling the Syracusans, fled through the interior and, almost to a man, made their way in safety to their native homes.

§ 14.75.7 Dionysius stationed guards at intervals along the roads and then led his army against the enemy's camp, while it was still night. The barbarians, abandoned as they were by their general, by the Carthaginians, and by the Siceli as well, were dispirited and fled in dismay.

§ 14.75.8 Some were taken captive as they fell in with weight guards on the roads, but the majority threw down their arms, surrendered themselves, and asked only that their lives be spared. Some Iberians alone massed together with their arms and dispatched a herald to treat about taking service with him.

§ 14.75.9 Dionysius made peace with the Iberians and enrolled them in his mercenaries, but the rest of the multitude he made captive and whatever remained of the baggage he turned over to the soldiers to plunder.

§ 14.76.1 With such swiftness did Fortune work a change in the affairs of the Carthaginians, and point out to all mankind that those who become elated above due measure quickly give proof of their own weakness.

§ 14.76.2 For they who had in their hands practically all the cities of Sicily with the exception of Syracuse and expected its capture, of a sudden were forced to be anxious for their own fatherland; they who overthrew the tombs of the Syracusans gazed upon one hundred and fifty thousand dead lying in heaps and unburied because of the plague; they who wasted with fire the territory of the Syracusans now in their turn saw their own fleet of a sudden go usurp in flames; they who so arrogantly sailed with their whole armada into the harbour and flaunted their successes before the Syracusans had little thought that they were to steal away by night and leave their allies at the mercy of their enemy.

§ 14.76.3 The general himself, who had taken the sanctuary of Zeus for his quarters and the pillaged wealth of the sanctuaries for his own possession, slipped away in disgrace to Carthage with a few survivors, in order that he might not by dying and paying a debt to nature go unscathed for his acts of impiety, but should in his native land lead a life that was notorious, while reproaches were heaped on him on every hand.

§ 14.76.4 Indeed, so calamitous was his lot that he went about the temples of the city in the cheapest clothing, charging himself with impiety and offering acknowledged retribution to heaven for his sins against the gods. In the end he passed sentence of death upon himself and starved himself to death. And he bequeathed to his fellow citizens a deep respect for religion, for straightway Fortune heaped upon them the other calamities of war as well.

§ 14.77.1 When the news of the Carthaginian disaster had spread throughout Libya, their allies, who had long hated the oppressive rule of the Carthaginians and even more at this time because of the betrayal of the soldiers at Syracuse, were inflamed against them.

§ 14.77.2 Consequently, being led on partly by anger and partly by contempt for them because of the disaster they had suffered, they endeavoured to assert their independence. After exchanging messages with one another they collected an army, moved forward, and pitched camp in the open.

§ 14.77.3 Since they were speedily joined not only by freemen but also by slaves, there was gathered in a short time a body of two hundred thousand men. Seizing Tynes, a city situated not far from Carthage, they based their line of battle on it, and since they had the better of the fighting, they confined the Phoenicians within their walls.

§ 14.77.4 The Carthaginians, against whom the gods were clearly fighting, at first gathered in small groups and in great confusion and besought the deity to put an end to its wrath; thereupon the entire city was seized by superstitious fear and dread, as every man anticipated in imagination the enslavement of the city. Consequently they voted by every means to propitiate the gods who had been sinned against.

§ 14.77.5 Since they had included neither Core nor Demeter in their rites, they appointed their most renowned citizens to be priests of these goddesses, and consecrating statues of them with all solemnity, they conducted their rites, following the ritual used by the Greeks. They also chose out the most prominent Greeks who lived among them and assigned them to the service of the goddesses. After this they constructed ships and made careful provision of supplies for the war.

§ 14.77.6 Meanwhile the revolters, who were a motley mass, possessed no capable commanders, and what was of first importance, they were short of provisions because they were so numerous, while the Carthaginians brought supplies by sea from Sardinia. Furthermore, they quarrelled among themselves over the supreme command and some of them were bought off with Carthaginian money and deserted the common cause. As a result, both because of the lack of provisions and because of treachery on the part of some, they broke up and scattered to their native lands, thus relieving the Carthaginians of the greatest fear. Such was the state of affairs in Libya at this time.

§ 14.78.1 Dionysius, seeing that the mercenaries were most hostile to him and fearing that they might depose him, first of all arrested Aristotle, their commander.

§ 14.78.2 At this, when the body of them ran together under arms and demanded their pay with some sharpness, Dionysius declared that he was sending Aristotle to Lacedemon to face trial among his fellow citizens, and offered to the mercenaries, who numbered about ten thousand, in lieu of their pay the city and territory of the Leontines.

§ 14.78.3 To this they gladly agreed because the territory was good land, and after portioning it out in allotments they made their home in Leontini. Dionysius then recruited other mercenaries and trusted in them and his freedmen to maintain the government.

§ 14.78.4 After the disaster which the Carthaginians had suffered, the survivors from the cities of Sicily that had been enslaved gathered together, gained back their native lands, and revived their strength.

§ 14.78.5 Dionysius settled in Messene a thousand Locrians, four thousand Medmaeans, and six hundred Messenians from the Peloponnesus who were exiles from Zacynthus and Naupactus. But when he observed that the Lacedemonians were offended that the Messenians whom they had driven out were settled in a renowned city, he removed them from Messene, and giving them a place on the sea, he cut off some area of Abacaene and annexed it to their territory.

§ 14.78.6 The Messenians named their city Tyndaris, and by living in concord together and admitting many to citizenship, they speedily came to number more than five thousand citizens.

§ 14.78.7 After this Dionysius waged a number of campaigns against the territory of the Siceli, in the course of which he took Menaenum and Morgantinum and struck a treaty with Agyris, the tyrant of the Agyrinaeans, and Damon, the lord of the Centoripans, as well as with the Herbitaeans and the Assorini. He also gained by treachery Cephaloedium, Solus, and Enna, and made peace besides with the Herbessini. Such was the state of affairs in Sicily at this time.

§ 14.79.1 In Greece the Lacedemonians, foreseeing how great their war with the Persians would be, put one of the two kings, Agesilaus, in command. After he had levied six thousand soldiers and constitute a council of thirty of his foremost fellow citizens, he transported the armament from Aulis to Ephesus.

§ 14.79.2 Here he enlisted four thousand soldiers and took the field with his army, which numbered ten thousand infantry and four hundred cavalry. They were also accompanied by a throng of no less number which provided a market and was intent upon plunder.

§ 14.79.3 He traversed the Plain of Cayster and laid waste the territory held by the Persians until he arrived at Cyme. From this as his base he spent the larger part of the summer ravaging Phrygia and neighbouring territory; and after sating his army with pillage he returned toward the beginning of autumn to Ephesus.

§ 14.79.4 While these events were taking place, the Lacedemonians dispatched ambassadors to Nephereus, the king of Egypt, to conclude an alliance; he, in place of the aid requested, made the Spartans a gift of equipment for one hundred triremes and five hundred thousand measures of grain. Pharax, the Lacedemonian admiral, sailing from Rhodes with one hundred and twenty ships, put in at Sasanda in Caria, a fortress one hundred and fifty stades from Caunus.

§ 14.79.5 From this as his base he laid siege to Caunus and blockaded Conon, who was commander of the King's fleet and lay at Caunus with forty ships. But when Artaphernes and Pharnabazus came with strong forces to the aid of the Caunians, Pharax lifted the siege and sailed off to Rhodes with the entire fleet.

§ 14.79.6 After this Conon gathered eighty triremes and sailed to the Chersonesus, and the Rhodians, having expelled the Peloponnesian fleet, revolted from the Lacedemonians and received Conon, together with his entire fleet, into their city.

§ 14.79.7 Now the Lacedemonians, who were bringing the gift of grain from Egypt, being unaware of the defection of the Rhodians, approached the island in full confidence; but the Rhodians and Conon, the Persian admiral, brought the ships in the harbours and stored the city with grain.

§ 14.79.8 There also came to Conon ninety triremes, ten of them from Cilicia and eighty from Phoenicia, under the command of the lord of the Sidonians.

§ 14.80.1 After this Agesilaus led forth his army into the Plain of Cayster and the country around Sipylus and ravaged the possessions of the inhabitants. Tissaphernes, gathering ten thousand cavalry and fifty thousand infantry, followed close on the Lacedemonians and cut down any who became separate from the main body while plundering. Agesilaus formed his soldiers in a square and clung to the foothills of Mt. Sipylus, awaiting a favourable opportunity to attack the enemy.

§ 14.80.2 He overran the countryside as far as Sardis and ravaged the orchards and the pleasure-park belonging to Tissaphernes, which had been artistically laid out at great expense with plants and all other things that contribute to luxury and the enjoyment in peace of the good things of life. He then turned back, and when he was midway between Sardis and Thybarnae, he dispatched by night the Spartan Xenocles with fourteen hundred soldiers to a thickly wooded place to set an ambush for the barbarians.

§ 14.80.3 Then Agesilaus himself moved at daybreak along the way with his army. And when he had passed the place of ambush and the barbarians were advancing upon him without battle order and harassing his rearguard, to their surprise he suddenly turned about on the Persians. When a sharp battle followed, he raised the signal to the soldiers in ambush and they, chanting the battle song, charged the enemy. The Persians, seeing that they were caught between the forces, were struck with dismay and turned at once in flight.

§ 14.80.4 Pursuing them for some distance, Agesilaus slew over six thousand of them, gathered a great multitude of prisoners, and pillaged their camp which was stored with goods of many sorts.

§ 14.80.5 Tissaphernes, thunderstruck at the daring of the Lacedemonians, withdrew from the battle to Sardis, and Agesilaus was about to attack the satrapies farther inland, but led his army back to the sea when he could not obtain favourable omens from the sacrifices.

§ 14.80.6 When Artaxerxes, the King of Asia, learned of the defeats, being alarmed by the war with the Greeks, he was angry at Tissaphernes, since he considered him to be responsible for the war. He had also been asked by his mother, Parysatis, to grant her revenge upon Tissaphernes, for she hated him for denouncing her son Cyrus, when he made his attack upon his brother.

§ 14.80.7 Accordingly Artaxerxes appointed Tithraustes commander with orders to arrest Tissaphernes and sent letters to the cities and the satraps that all should perform whatever he commanded.

§ 14.80.8 Tithraustes, on arriving at Colossae in Phrygia, with the aid of Ariaeus, a satrap, arrested Tissaphernes while he was in the bath, cut off his head, and sent it to the King. Then he persuaded Agesilaus to enter into negotiations and concluded with him a truce of six months.

§ 14.81.1 While affairs in Asia were handled as we have described, the Phocians went to war with the Boeotians because of certain grievances and persuaded the Lacedemonians to join them against the Boeotians. At first they sent Lysander to them with a few soldiers, who, on entering Phocis, gathered an army; but later the king, Pausanias, was dispatched there with six thousand soldiers.

§ 14.81.2 The Boeotians persuaded the Athenians to take part with them in the war, but at the time they took the field alone and found Haliartus under siege by Lysander and the Phocians. In the battle which followed Lysander fell together with many Lacedemonians and their allies. The entire body of other Boeotians speedily turned back from the pursuit, but some two hundred Thebans advanced rather rashly into rugged terrain and were slain.

§ 14.81.3 This was called the Boeotian War. Pausanias, the king of the Lacedemonians, on learning of the defeat, concluded a truce with the Boeotians and led his army back to the Peloponnesus.

§ 14.81.4 Conon, the admiral of the Persians, put the Athenians Hieronymus and Nicodemus in charge of the fleet and himself set forth with intent to interview the King. He sailed along the coast of Cilicia, and when he had gone on to Thapsacus in Syria, he then took boat by the Euphrates river to Babylon.

§ 14.81.5 Here he met the King and promised that he would destroy the Lacedemonians' naval power if the King would furnish him with such money and other supplies as his plan required.

§ 14.81.6 Artaxerxes approved Conon, honoured him with rich gifts, and appointed a paymaster who should supply funds in abundance as Conon might assign them. He also gave him authority to take as his associate leader for the war any Persian he might choose. Conon selected the satrap Pharnabazus and then returned to the sea, having arranged everything to suit his purpose.

§ 14.82.1 At the close of this year, in Athenian Diophantus entered upon the archonship, and in Rome, in place of consuls, the consular magistracy was exercised by six military tribunes, Lucius Valerius, Marcus Furius, Quintus Servilius, and Quintus Sulpicius. After these men had assumed their magistracies the Boeotians and Athenians, together with the Corinthians and the Argives, concluded an alliance with each other.

§ 14.82.2 It was their thought that, since the Lacedemonians were hated by their allies because of their harsh rule, it would be an easy matter to overthrow their supremacy, given that the strongest states were of one mind. First of all, they set up a common Council in Corinth to which they sent representatives to form plans, and worked out in common the arrangements for the war. Then they dispatched ambassadors to the cities and caused many allies of the Lacedemonians to withdraw from them;

§ 14.82.3 for at once all of Euboea and the Leucadians joined them, as well as the Acarnanians, Ambraciots, and the Chalcidians of Thrace.

§ 14.82.4 They also attempted to persuade the inhabitants of the Peloponnesus to revolt from the Lacedemonians, but no one listened to them; for Sparta, lying as it does along the side of it, was a kind of citadel and fortress of the entire Peloponnesus.

§ 14.82.5 Medius, the lord of Larissa in Thessaly, was at war with Lycophron, the tyrant of Pherae, and when he asked for aid to be sent him, the Council dispatched to him two thousand soldiers.

§ 14.82.6 After the troops had arrived Medius seized Pharsalus, in which there was a garrison of Lacedemonians, and sold the inhabitants as booty. After this the Boeotians and Argives, parting company with Medius, seized Heracleia in Trachis; and on being admitted at night within the walls by certain persons, they put to the sword the Lacedemonians whom they seized but allowed the other Peloponnesians to leave with their possessions.

§ 14.82.7 They then summoned to the city the Trachinians whom the Lacedemonians had banished from their homes, and gave them the city as their dwelling-place; and indeed they were the most ancient settlers of this territory. After this Ismenias, the leader of the Boeotians, left the Argives in the city to serve as its garrison and himself persuaded the Aenianians and the Athamanians to revolt from the Lacedemonians and gathered soldiers from among them and their allies. After he had recruited a little less than six thousand men, he took the field against the Phocians.

§ 14.82.8 While he was taking up quarters in Naryx in Locris, which men say was the birthplace of Ajax, the people of the Phocians came against him in arms under the command of Alcisthenes the Laconian.

§ 14.82.9 A sharp and protracted battle followed, in which the Boeotians were the victors. Pursuing the fugitives until nightfall, they slew not many less than a thousand, but lost of their own troops in the battle about five hundred.

§ 14.82.10 After the pitched battle both sides dismissed their armies to their native lands, and the members of the Council in Corinth, since affairs were progressing as they desired, gathered to Corinth soldiers from all the cities, more than fifteen thousand infantry and about five hundred cavalry.

§ 14.83.1 When the Lacedemonians saw that the greatest cities of Greece were uniting against them, they voted to summon Agesilaus and his army from Asia. In the meantime they gathered from their own levy and their allies twenty-three thousand infantry and five hundred cavalry and advanced to meet the enemy.

§ 14.83.2 The battle took place along the river Nemea, lasting until nightfall, and parts of both armies had the advantage, but of the Lacedemonians and their allies eleven hundred men fell, while of the Boeotians and their allies but also twenty-eight hundred.

§ 14.83.3 After Agesilaus had conveyed his army across from Asia to Europe, at first he was opposed by certain Thracians with a large force; these he defeated in battle, slaying the larger number of the barbarians. Then he made his way through Macedonia, passing through the same country as Xerxes did when he made his campaign against the Greeks.

§ 14.83.4 When Agesilaus had traversed Macedonia and Thessaly and made his way through the pass of Thermopylae, he continued.... Conon the Athenian and Pharnabazus were in command of the King's fleet and were tarrying in Loryma of the Chersonesus. 6 On sailing from there he fell in with the King's fleet, and engaging the leading ships, he won the advantage over them; but when the Persians came to give aid with their triremes in close formation, all his allies fled to the land. But Peisander turned his own ship against them, believing ignoble flight to be disgraceful and unworthy of Sparta. 7 After fighting brilliantly and slaying many of the enemy, in the end he was overcome, battling in a manner worthy of his native land. Conon pursued the Lacedemonians as far as the land and captured fifty of their triremes. As for the crews, most of them leaped overboard and escaped by land, but about five hundred were captured. The rest of the triremes found safety at Cnidus.

§ 14.84.1 Agesilaus enlisted more soldiers from the Peloponnesus and then advanced with his army against Boeotia, whereupon the Boeotians, together with their allies, at once set out to Coroneia of the meet him. In the battle which followed the Thebans defeated the forces opposed to them and pursued them as far as their camp, but the others held out only a short time and then were forced by Agesilaus and his troops to take to flight.

§ 14.84.2 Therefore the Lacedemonians, looking upon themselves as conquerors, set up a trophy and gave back the dead to the enemy under a truce. There fell of the Boeotians and their allies more than six hundred, but of the Lacedemonians and their associates three hundred and fifty. Agesilaus, who had suffered many wounds, was taken to Delphi, where he looked after his physical needs.

§ 14.84.3 After the sea-fight Pharnabazus and Conon put out to sea with all their ships against the allies of the Lacedemonians. First of all they induced the people of Cos to secede, and then those of Nisyros and of Teos. After this the Chians expelled their garrison and joined Conon, and similarly the Mitylenaeans and Ephesians and Erythraeans changed sides.

§ 14.84.4 Something like the same eagerness for change infected all the cities, of which some expelled their Lacedemonian garrisons and maintained their freedom, while others attached themselves to Conon. As for the Lacedemonians, from this time they lost the sovereignty of the sea. Conon, having decided to sail with the entire fleet to Attica, put out to sea, and after bringing over to his cause the islands of the Cyclades, he sailed against the island of Cythera.

§ 14.84.5 Mastering it at once on the first assault, he sent the Cytherians under a truce to Laconia, left an adequate garrison for the city, and sailed for Corinth. After putting in there he discussed with the members of the Council such points as they wished, made an alliance with them, left them money, and then sailed off to Asia.

§ 14.84.6 At this time Aeropus, the king of the Macedonians, died of illness after a reign of six years, and was succeeded in the sovereignty by his son Pausanias, who ruled for one year.

§ 14.84.7 Theopompus of Chios ended with this year and the battle of Cnidus his Hellenistic History, which he wrote in twelve books. This historian began with the battle of Cynossema, with which Thucydides ended his work, and covered in his account a period of seventeen years.

§ 14.85.1 At the conclusion of the year, in Athens Eubulides was archon and in Rome the consular magistracy was administered by six military tribunes, Lucius Sergius, Aulus Postumius, Publius Cornelius, and Quintus Manlius.

§ 14.85.2 At this time Conon, who held the command of the King's fleet, put in at the Peiraeus with eighty triremes and promised the citizens to rebuild the fortifications of the city; for the whiles of the Peiraeus and the Long Walls had been destroyed in accordance with the terms the Athenians had concluded with the Lacedemonians when they were reduced in the Peloponnesian War.

§ 14.85.3 Accordingly Conon hired a multitude of skilled workers, and putting at their service the general run of his crews, he speedily rebuilt the larger part of the wall. For the Thebans too sent five hundred skilled workers and masons, and some other cities also gave assistance.

§ 14.85.4 But Tiribazus, who commanded the land forces in Asia, was envious of Conon's successes, and on the plea that Conon was using the King's armaments to win the cities for the Athenians, he lured him to Sardis, where he arrested him, threw him in chains, and remanded him to custody.

§ 14.86.1 In Corinth certain men who favoured a democracy, banding together while contests were being held in the theatre, instituted a slaughter and filled the city with civil strife; and when the Argives gave them their support in their turn, they put to the sword one hundred and twenty of the citizens and drove five hundred into exile.

§ 14.86.2 While the Lacedemonians were making preparations to restore the exiles and gathering an army, the Athenians and Boeotians came to the aid of the murderers, in order that they might secure the adhesion of the city.

§ 14.86.3 The exiles, together with the Lacedemonians and their allies, attacked Lechaeum and the dock-yard by night and seized them by storm; and on the next day, when the troops of the city, which Iphicrates commanded, came out against them, a battle followed in which the Lacedemonians were victorious and slew no small number of their opponents.

§ 14.86.4 After this the Boeotians and Athenians, and with them the Argives and Corinthians, came with all their forces to Lechaeum, and at the outset they laid siege to the place and forced their way into the corridor between the walls; but afterward the Lacedemonians and the exiles put up a brilliant fight and forced out the Boeotians and all who were with them. They then, having lost about a thousand soldiers, returned to the city.

§ 14.86.5 And since the Isthmian Games were now at hand, there was a quarrel over who should conduct them. After much contention the Lacedemonians had their way and saw to it that the exiles conducted festival.

§ 14.86.6 Since the severe fighting in the war took place for the most part about Corinth, it was called the Corinthian War, and it continued for eight years.

§ 14.87.1 In Sicily the people of Rhegium, bringing the charge against Dionysius that in fortifying Messene he was making preparations against them, first of all offered asylum to those who were expelled by Dionysius and were active against him, and then settled in Mylae the surviving Naxians and Catanians, prepared an army, and dispatched as its general Heloris to lay siege to Messene.

§ 14.87.2 When Heloris made a reckless attack upon the acropolis, the Messenians and the mercenaries of Dionysius, who were holding the city, closed ranks and advanced against him. In the battle that followed the Messenians were victorious and slew more than five hundred of their opponents.

§ 14.87.3 Marching straightway against Mylae, they seized the city and let the Naxians who had been settled there go free under a truce. These, accordingly, departed to the Siceli and the Greek cities and made their dwelling some in one place and others in another.

§ 14.87.4 Dionysius, now that the regions about the Straits had been brought to friendly terms with him, planned to lead an army against Rhegium, but he had trouble with the Siceli who held Tauromenium.

§ 14.87.5 Deciding, therefore, that it would be to his advantage to attack them first, he led out his forces against them, pitched a camp on the side toward Naxos, and persisted in the siege during the winter, in the belief that the Siceli would desert the hill since they had not been dwelling there long.

§ 14.88.1 The Siceli, however, had an ancient tradition, handed down from their ancestors, that these parts of the island had been the possession of the Siceli, when Greeks first landed there and founded Naxos, expelling from that very hill the Siceli who were then dwelling on it. Maintaining, therefore, that they had only recovered territory that belonged to their fathers and were justly righting the wrongs which the Greeks had committed against their ancestors, they put forth every effort to hold the hill.

§ 14.88.2 While extraordinary rivalry was being displayed on both sides, the winter solstice occurred, and because of the consequent winter storms the area about the acropolis was filled with snow. Thereupon Dionysius, who had discovered that the Siceli were careless in their guard of the acropolis because of its strength and the unusual height of the wall, advanced on a moonless and stormy night against the loftiest sectors.

§ 14.88.3 After many difficulties both because of the obstacles offered by the crags and because of the great depth of the snow he occupied one peak, although his face was frosted and his vision impaired by the cold. After this he broke through to the other side and led his army into the city. But when the Siceli came up in a body, the troops of Dionysius were thrust out and Dionysius himself was struck on the corslet in the flight, sent scrambling, and barely escaped being taken alive.

§ 14.88.4 Since the Siceli pressed upon them from superior ground, more than six hundred of Dionysius' troops were slain and most of them lost their complete armour, while Dionysius himself saved only his corslet.

§ 14.88.5 After this disaster the Acragantini and Messenians banished the partisans of Dionysius, asserted their freedom, and renounced their alliance with the tyrant.

§ 14.89.1 Pausanias, the king of the Lacedemonians, was accused by his fellow citizens and went into exile after a reign of fourteen years, and his son Agesipolis succeeded to the kingship and reigned for the same length of time as his father.

§ 14.89.2 Pausanias too, the king of the Macedonians, died after a reign of one year, being assassinated by Amyntas, who seized the kingship and reigned twenty-four years.

§ 14.90.1 At the conclusion of this year, in Athens Demostratus took over the archonship, and in Rome the cease magistracy was administered by six military tribunes, 2 Lucius Titinius, Publius Licinius, Publius Melaeus, Quintus Mallius, Gnaeus Genycius, and Lucius Atilius. After these magistrates had entered office, Magon, the Carthaginian general, was stationed in Sicily. He set about retrieving the Carthaginian cause after the disaster they had suffered, 3 for he showed kindness to the subject cities and received the victims of Dionysius' wars. He also formed alliances with most of the Siceli and, after gathering armaments, launched an attack upon the territory of Messene. After ravaging the countryside and seizing much booty he marched from that place and went into camp near the city of Abacaene, which was his ally. 4 When Dionysius came up with his army, the forces drew up for battle, and after a sharp engagement Dionysius was the victor. The Carthaginians fled into the city after a loss of more than eight hundred men, while Dionysius withdrew for the time being to Syracuse; but after a few days he manned one hundred triremes and set out against the Rhegians. 5 Arriving unexpectedly by night before the city, he put fire to the gates and set ladders against the walls. The Rhegians, coming up in defence as they did at first in small numbers, endeavoured to put out the flames, but later, when their general Heloris arrived and advised them to do just the opposite, they saved the city. 6 For if they had put out the fire, they would not have been strong enough to prevent Dionysius from entering, being far too small a number; but by bringing firewood and timbers from the neighbouring houses they made the flames higher, until the main body of their troops could assemble in arms and come to the defence. 7 Dionysius, who had failed of his design, traversed the countryside, wasting it in flames and cutting down orchards, and then concluded a truce for a year and sailed off to Syracuse.

§ 14.91.1 The Greek inhabitants of Italy, when they saw the encroachments of Dionysius advancing as far as their own lands, formed an alliance among themselves and established a Council. It was their hope to defend themselves with ease against Dionysius and to resist the neighbouring Leucani; for these last were also at war with them at this time.

§ 14.91.2 The exiles who held Lechaeum in Corinthian territory, being admitted into the city in the night, endeavoured to get possession of the walls, but when the troops of Iphicrates came up against them, they lost three hundred of their number and fled back to the ship station. Some days later a contingent of the Lacedemonian army was passing through Corinthian territory, when Iphicrates and some of the allies in Corinth fell on them and slew the larger number.

§ 14.91.3 Iphicrates with his peltasts advanced against the territory of Phlius, and joining battle with the men of the city, he slew more than three hundred of them. Then, when he advanced against Sicyon, the Sicyonians offered battle before their walls but lost about five hundred men and found refuge within their city.

§ 14.92.1 After these events had taken place, the Argives took up arms in full force and marched against Corinth, and after seizing the acropolis and securing the city for themselves, they made the Corinthian territory Argive.

§ 14.92.2 The Athenian Iphicrates also had the design to seize the city, since it was advantageous for the control of Greece; but when the Athenian people opposed it, he resigned his position. The Athenians appointed Chabrias general in his place and sent him to Corinth.